• Govt turns to France for fuel
• New Ziana to take over two ZBC radio stations
• Election campaign will hurt economic recovery - analysts
• Govt blocks Geneva-based parliamentary union tour
• Kunonga stirs fresh controversy
• Tobacco merchants clinch fuel deal
• MDC botched 'final push' - civic groups
• New farmers cripple rural council operations
• Bennett sues Mugabe for incitement
• Dispossessed farmers to export maize to Zim
• Daily News editor charged under Posa
• Land reform hits dairy/beef exports
• Govt muddles through economic policy vacuum
• Bare flagpoles
• Africa needs help - from blacks and whites
• Mugabe’s battered ego not the priority
• Seeing ourselves as others see us
• Don’t confuse the comrades
• Pay up immediately, Zesa told

This emerged as President Robert Mugabe this week renewed his hunt for fuel
in Libya. Mugabe, who last year said the fuel problem was giving him
"headaches and stomach pains", left for Tripoli on Wednesday in a bid to
resuscitate the frozen US$360 million fuel deal with Libya's Tamoil, first
signed two years ago.

The deal has been on ice because Zimbabwe is unable to pay.

Sources said Mugabe was likely to return from Libya empty-handed unless he
mortgages what his government has classified as "strategic assets" as part
of the deal.

Tamoil has been demanding specific assets before it agrees to revive the
arrangement that guarantees Zimbabwe a year's supply of fuel.

The Libyans, who last visited Zimbabwe in May in connection with the fuel
wrangle, want to acquire Noczim's 50% equity in Petrozim, which it jointly
owns with Lonrho.

Noczim is asking US$100 million while the Libyans are prepared to pay only
US$48 million.

Tamoil, which is owed over US$60 million by government, also wants to
acquire vital fuel infrastructure before any deal is done.

They want to buy the Mutare-Harare pipeline and Msasa depot and acquire
service stations as part of the arrangement. The government is reluctant to
release the assets because of the deadlock over the price.

Before Mugabe left for Libya with a large delegation of government
officials, bankers and fuel sector representatives, a meeting was held by
stakeholders on Monday at the Jewel Bank's executive chambers. Sources said
the asset- mortgaging issue loomed large at the meeting.

Efforts to get comment from Jewel Bank chief executive Gideon Gono yesterday
were unsuccessful as he was said to be in Libya.

Sources said government is now hoping against hope that TotalFinaElf will
help it out of the crisis that has been lingering since 1999.

"We understand government has been in touch with TotalFinaElf for a fuel
supply deal," an industry source said. "It appears there has been a
gentleman's agreement on the issue although there are still things that need
to be sorted out first."

Stanislas Mittelman, TotalFinaElf Zimbabwe chief executive, and the
company's marketing and public affairs director Stanley Hatendi were not
available for comment yesterday.

The TotalFinaElf group is currently developing a US$3,4 billion oil project
in Angola.

Angola's state-owned Sonangol, the concessionaire, recently authorised
TotalFinaElf to tender key contracts for the development of the Dalia oil
field, which includes 34 production wells, 30 water injection wells and
three gas injection wells.

The multinational has already launched the project capable of processing 240
000 barrels of oil per day.

The Dalia floating production storage and offloading facility will have a
storage capacity of two million barrels of oil.

Government has been trying to entice TotalFinaElf, which is partly
Belgian-owned, to enter into a deal. It has sold the company the country's
largest storage facilities at Beitbridge. Now the government is in the
process of selling its 51% stake in the vital Oil Blending Enterprises Ltd
(Obel) which supplies lubricants. Total already controls 49% of Obel.

Zimbabwe has been trying to source fuel from Angola for some time now.

Angola, the second largest oil producer in sub-Saharan Africa after Nigeria,
is pumping 760 000 barrels a day from its vast offshore oil fields.

The government has also been trying to secure fuel from Kuwait, United Arab
Emirates, Sudan, Iran, South Africa, Botswana, and Nigeria.

The dismal failure of the much-touted restructuring exercise, dubbed Vision
30 in November 2001, has driven the ZBC into further debt, leaving
management and the board without any option but to try another
re-organisation which could result in more retrenchments and staff
transfers.

ZBC chief executive officer Munyaradzi Hwengwere confirmed yesterday that
the corporation would soon implement a restructuring exercise, but claimed
"not a single worker will be retrenched".

Last September the ZBC retrenched 435 workers under its Vision 30
restructuring exercise. The workers claim they have not received their
terminal benefits.

Hwengwere refused to give details on the transfer of stations to New Ziana.

The New Ziana project was launched last year to replace the poorly-funded
news agency, Ziana. Under the project, community radio stations as well as
newspapers would be established to improve the dissemination of information
to grassroots communities.

However, a general lack of funding has so far delayed the launch of the
project.

Happison Muchechetere, head of the electronic division at New Ziana, said he
was not aware of the transfer of the stations.

"I am not yet aware of that," he said. "That is news to me, but I would
appreciate it. We will have radio and television services. We have already
invited tenders for the provision of equipment to be used by the stations."

As part of the streamlining of operations sources at Pockets Hill this week
said two out of the four radio stations under ZBC would be transferred to
New Ziana. The other two would become autonomous entities, which Hwengwere
said would be registered as separate companies but continue to operate under
the state-run broadcaster.

The four stations under ZBC have failed to operate as commercial entities as
advertisers have fled from the airwaves in droves.

Sources at ZBC this week said the decision to restructure followed a series
of meetings held by the board and management over the past weeks

Morale is reportedly at its lowest ebb at ZBC, with suspensions and
dismissals now frequent. The restructuring, sources said, was aimed at
reducing the workforce and generating income through the various stations
and services offered by the corporation.

The sources added that ZTV would also become an independent company, as well
as the corporation's Production Services.

"We have always been telling the world that we are implementing a continuous
restructuring exercise," Hwengwere said. "In other words, we are still
implementing Vision 30. This time we want to establish the commercial
viability of the corporation. Our plans are to create six companies from the
radio and television stations, which will be legally registered and stand
alone as independent entities," he said.

Hwengwere refused to comment on the transfer of two radio stations to New
Ziana. "We can't engage in such talks now," he said. "Aren't we talking
about ZBC? How does New Ziana come in?"

Insiders said the restructuring process would affect at least 150 of the 500
workers currently employed by the corporation.

"They want to reduce the workforce, but at the same time they are trying to
avoid paying retrenchment packages. We wonder how they are going to achieve
that," said a senior ZBC employee.

The state-run corporation has been in difficulty since Moyo embarked on a
campaign to use the broadcaster as a propaganda machine for the government
and ruling Zanu PF party. After the launch of Vision 30, massive recruitment
and appointments were made to boost its partisan agenda ahead of last year's
presidential election.

This raised the workforce to about 900 and pushed the salary bill to an
unsustainable $7 billion which led to the accumulation of huge debts. Last
August, ZBC owed debts to various companies of up to $655 million.

At the same time, advertisers shunned ZBC en masse, and that, coupled with
Moyo's ill-advised move to order the abandonment of sponsored programmes,
effectively destroyed the corporation's income-generating potential.

Hwengwere yesterday confirmed the broadcaster's financial crisis.

"We inherited a historical debt which will not be dealt with overnight. I
think since the launch of Vision 30 a lot has happened which has seen an
increase in the commercial value (of ZBC)."

Mugabe's term as president should officially end in 2008.

Civil rights campaigner Brian Kagoro said Mugabe wants to save face by
shortening his term as a way of bargaining his exit with the opposition.

"It might be an indication that he wants to amend the constitution and have
the presidential election concurrently with the general election in 2005,"
said Kagoro.

President Mugabe suggested last week during his whirlwind tour of the
countryside that his party should start preparing for the 2005 election.

"We should start preparing for the elections now because 2005 is not far
away. There is only one and a half to two years to go," he told party
supporters at a rally in Shurugwi last Thursday.

This is expected to usher in another period of political upheaval. Most
seriously it is bound to jeopardise economic recovery.

The country has been in election campaign mode for three years with
politicians embarking on self-serving programmes at the expense of key
policy issues like Aids prevention and food security.

Analysts say Mugabe would be happy to have the country in a perpetual state
of instability as a way of distracting the populace from his failed policies
on land and the economy.

MDC secretary for Legal Affairs David Coltart however said Mugabe's rallies
were not necessarily electioneering but an attempt to garner confidence
after he was rattled by the mass action.

"I am convinced that he is not electioneering but that he is reacting to the
mass action," said Coltart. "The mass action was a close call for Mugabe. He
is trying to build his own confidence in areas where he believes he has a
residue of support."

He said Mugabe would not call for an election until he was sure that Zanu PF
supporters would coalesce around a chosen successor.

Economist John Robertson said Mugabe's election campaign will drain the
limited resources left in government coffers since he often uses state
resources to fund such campaigns.

"He will be using money that should be going towards infrastructure
development," Robertson said.

The IPU delegation was expected to interview MPs and government officials on
the on-going country-wide human rights violations in a mission that had been
timed to start on Sunday and end yesterday. The IPU is an international
organisation of parliaments of sovereign states.

MDC MP for Harare North, Trudy Stevenson, yesterday said Foreign Affairs
minister Stan Mudenge failed to approve the visit thereby scuttling the
arrangement to which both the Minister of Justice, Patrick Chinamasa, and
the Speaker of Parliament, Emerson Mnangagwa, had agreed.

"Mnangagwa actually came back to us at the last minute to say the IPU needed
the approval of the Minister of Foreign Affairs," Stevenson said. The IPU
delegation was due to interview the MPs, their families and lawyers on the
human rights abuses which have seen opposition MPs arrested and tortured by
law enforcement agents.

Already the IPU has identified 19 MPs from the MDC who have either been
arrested on trumped up charges, tortured or assaulted by state agents and
the Zanu PF militia.

According to the Zimbabwe Human Rights Forum statistics for the year ended
December 2002 show there were 1 061 cases of torture, 227 abductions, 121
unlawful arrests and 111 unlawful detentions.

According to correspondence between Stevenson and the IPU officer in charge
of human rights, the delegation could now come at the end of July when
parliament is sitting.

"You may rest assured that we will make every effort for the mission to take
place," said Ingeborg Schwarz of the IPU's Standing Committee on Human
Rights for Parliamentarians

"We will propose new dates, most probably either the week 28 July to August
1 or the week 4 to 8 August when parliament is sitting, and seek the
agreement of the authorities to either of these dates."

In May 2003 Parliamentarians for Global Action asked the government to
adhere to the requirements of international law and asked Zimbabwe to ratify
the International Criminal Court.

Mass at St Paul's was held under a cloud of uncertainty after members of the
congregation had demanded a full explanation from the church executive
regarding reports of Kunonga's latest controversial move. The bishop made
the ruling last Wednesday.

The mass only proceeded after the priest pleaded with the congregation for
the issue to be discussed at the end. As soon as the church executive had
notified the congregation about the bishop's decision, anti-Kunonga
demonstrations ensued.

Youths holding a placard inscribed, Kunonga wairasa, yawaronga haiite
(Kunonga you have lost the plot, what you intend to do is impossible) toyi-
toyed as they led in singing derogatory songs.

Jonathan Makoni, a parishioner at St Paul's, took to the pulpit and
addressed the congregation.

"We are not going to bow to Kunonga's scheme aimed at bringing his puppet
here," said Makoni.

"We are demanding that Kunonga himself comes here and we tell him the truth.
We can't accept his political and poor ways of administration."

Mutete refused to comment, referring all questions to the executive, which
condemned Kunonga's decision as strange.

Sources within the Anglican Church said that the bishop was targeting
priests whom he deemed "politically incorrect" as well as those opposed to
his leadership style. It is understood that two other priests, in Mabvuku
and Marlborough, have also been ordered by Kunonga to transfer at very short
notice. Anglicans at the two parishes have expressed their displeasure with
Kunonga's latest moves.

Kunonga couldn't be contacted for comment as he was said to be out of his
office last week. However, the diocesan secretary, who only identified
himself as Gwedegwe said: "The diocese transfers priests whenever it feels.
The demonstrations as well as explanations being given by parishioners are
not important at all. That's all."

Meanwhile, sources said Anglicans from the three affected parishes are
planning to collaborate with those from St Mary's Cathedral in Harare to
petition Kunonga over his leadership, or alternatively file a lawsuit
against the bishop.

Kunonga has been involved in running battles with members of the church
since he took over from Tim Neill as bishop in 2001.

Kunonga has also been in the news for his open support of the ruling Zanu PF
party as well as government policies, especially the violent land seizures
widely condemned both at home and abroad.

He is also the only man of the cloth to have been slapped with sanctions by
the European Union last year.

"The three auction floors have put storage facilities in place," Millar
said. "It is our hope that the new arrangement will ease the transport
problems and boost deliveries of the crop to the auctions," said Miller.

The three auction floors are Tobacco Sales Floor (TSF), Burley Marketing
Zimbabwe (BMZ) and Zimbabwe Tobacco Auction Centre.

BMZ managing director Bruce Searles confirmed the arrangement to avail fuel
to farmers so that they can bring their crop to the floors. He said farmers
also needed fuel for land preparation in the coming season.

"Tobacco Marketing Board (TIMB), through Noczim, has agreed to source fuel
and deliver it to the three auction floors," Searles said. "The auction
floors will store the fuel so that farmers can buy it as they deliver their
crop to the floors. However, we haven't received anything as yet."

TSF managing director David Mashingaidze also confirmed the deal and their
capacity to store the fuel.

"We have tanks that can receive the fuel," Mashingaidze said. "As we speak
we are waiting for the fuel to be delivered to the floor."

These developments come amid reports of a record low delivery of the tobacco
crop to the auction floors this year. According to latest TIMB figures, a
mere 10,93 million kilogrammes of tobacco have gone through the three
auction floors over the past six weeks compared to a seasonal average of 22
million kg over the same period last year.

The figures also show that only 124 092 bales have been sold at the three
floors this year instead of a seasonal average of 228 201 bales.

Farming experts have attributed this year's thin delivery of the tobacco
crop to unavailability of fuel, shortage of curing coal and a small crop
caused by the chaotic land reform programme. An estimated 85 million kg
should be delivered to the auction floors, a drop from the 166 million kg
delivered last year.

The country has been hit by a fuel crisis owing to the failure by Noczim to
source the commodity. Noczim needs US$40 million a month to import fuel.

Miller said tobacco production was likely to decline further next year.

"We are concerned about next year's crop. The Tobacco Growers Trust does not
have enough inputs for the farmers. The interest rates for banks have also
been hiked and the cost of production has gone up by 500% this year," he
said.

Miller said farmers were pinning their hopes on the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe
to review the export rate to cover production costs.

"While the MDC's call for a stayaway from June 2/6 was well-heeded,
extensive state repression clearly had an effect on the willingness and
capacity of many individuals to participate in other aspects of the week of
action," the report says.

"Indeed, the aggressive role of the military and police may largely account
for the non-occurrence of anticipated mass demonstrations across the
country."

However, the report states that "these factors notwithstanding, the question
of the preparedness of the pro-democracy movement to engage in mass
demonstrations needs to be interrogated".

"There is a further need to reflect on four critical factors (from civil
society's perspective) that might also serve to explain the shortcomings of
"the final push", it says.

"The end game of the 'final push' was blurred in the messaging. While
repeated advertisements in the private press, flyers and posters informed
Zimbabweans that some action was imminent, communication of the specific
objectives of this action was less consistent."

The report states adverts inserted by the MDC before the action featured a
cartoon of an individual resembling President Robert Mugabe being chased by
a crowd led by MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, which was accompanied by
messages about the "countdown to the final push".

"This could have led many readers to believe that the 'final push' was about
chasing Mugabe out of State House, or forcing him out of office," the report
observes.

It says as the mass action drew closer, the MDC changed the tone of its
messages and started urging Zimbabweans to "stay calm and peaceful as we
engage in the on-going campaign to encourage Zanu PF to come to a serious
negotiating table and resolve the national crisis".

It exhorted the public to "protest peacefully - march for your freedom" and
announced that there would be marches in all major city centres.

But the report says the road map and finer details for the mass action were
not clear. It says the MDC was "vague about the specific form, content and
timing of the action".

"It was unclear, however, how such marches would proceed, in what way these
demonstrations would yield dialogue, and what demands the MDC was making on
such dialogue," it says.

"Adverts and messages before the 'D-Day' demonstrations scheduled for June 6
were more clear about the venue, but did not specify the time people were to
gather."

The report says this "contributed to some frustration among activists who
wanted to participate in demonstrations but who were not sure what was
expected of them".

"While everyone was looking for something beyond the stayaway, many were not
sure exactly what that would be," it states.

The report points out that Tsvangirai fuelled confusion days before the
protests when he said the MDC wanted a three-month transition arrangement
before fresh elections.

"A few days before the commencement of the 'final push'," the MDC released a
statement which indicated that transition should occur in terms of the
current defective Constitution of Zimbabwe," it says.

"In other words, it recommended that Mugabe should step down from office and
allow new elections to be held within 90 days of his resignation. This sent
mixed messages to civil society, as it smacked of "power first, principle
later."

New landowners have not started to pay tax while the government has refused
to give local authorities grants.

Councillors attending the fourth biennial congress of the Association of
Rural District Councils (ARDC) in Masvingo earlier this month appealed to
the Ministry of Local Government for help. The councillors complained that
their allowances were minimal.

"We are being paid as little as $90," said one councillor from Mashonaland
Central.

"The government has refused to give us allowances arguing that we have to
engage in income-generating projects. This is not possible because we cannot
compete with our ratepayers and taxpayers," he said.

The non-payment of levies and taxes by the new farmers is affecting the
operations of the 58 RDCs throughout the country.

Chairman of the ARDC Jerry Gotora said there was no going back on demanding
what councils were owed.

"We will attach the property (agricultural implements) of any defaulters,"
said Gotora.

"The property will then be sold if the payments are not settled. It is clear
that farmers do not want their properties to end up this way and we hope
they will pay," he said.

Gotora said they expected to raise more money because the number of farmers
had increased as a result of resettlement.

He accused the Ministry of Agriculture of being a stumbling block in the
collection of taxes.

"We need the ministry to supply us with the exact number of people who have
been resettled for easy collection of levies and taxes. It is this absence
of correct figures that is causing problems," said Gotora.

The government continues to issue conflicting figures on the number of
people who have benefited from the land reform exercise. The official figure
is 300 000 under the Model A1 scheme but this was recently interpreted to
mean households.

The farmers are required to pay unit tax to their district councils and some
local authorities have started collecting the money. Those settled under the
A1 scheme are required to pay levies

Gotora said the taxes and levies would be used for development projects such
as the construction of roads, clinics and schools.

The government has passed the buck to the new farmers after failing to fund
the land reform exercise which has also been shunned by the international
donor community.

This follows Mugabe's utterances at a rally in Nyakomba in Nyanga on June 12
where he reportedly said there was no place for white farmers whom he
accused of destabilising the country. He singled out Bennett and another
farmer, Pieter de Klerk.

"These Bennetts and the De Klerks are not deserving cases in regards to
allocation of land, because they are destabilising our society," said
Mugabe. "They are for illegality; they are supporting a party in its
programme of pursuing an illegal course to power," he told the rally.

"All those who are working in this illegal way, in this manner of
destablising our society, do not deserve a portion of our land at all. If
they have it, if they have that land, that land will be taken from them and
be given to more loyal citizens," he said.

"So I don't want to hear that there is a Bennett, that there is a de Klerk
who continues to destablise our well being, they must go from here," he was
reported as saying.

Soon after Mugabe's remarks, on June 15, 250 Zanu PF youths and war veterans
descended on the farm being leased by Bennett in Ruwa, destroying property
valued at around $111, 5 million.

Bennett said he lost property amounting to $60 million while $51,5 million
belonging to his farm manager and workers was also lost.

"I will sue Mugabe in his personal capacity," said Bennett.

"The president of a country is not God and he is not above the law," he
said.

"He is a normal person like you and me and when he personally orders acts of
violence and criminality he is accountable and no immunity can protect him,"
Bennett said.

However, the suit faces legal hurdles as Rule 18 of the High Court
stipulates that no civil suit may be raised against the president without
leave of the court.

Bennett said he had a video and a transcript of the Nyanga rally which he
would use as evidence.

"The three police officers who came from Epworth to investigate the matter
were told (by the invaders at Ruwa) in no uncertain terms that the invaders
were responding to the president's call. The officers left without doing
anything," said Bennett.

Bennett's Charleswood farm in Chimanimani was also invaded last Saturday.

Bennett said members of the Central Intelligence Organisation, war veterans
and police moved onto the farm and arrested six workers before charging them
under the Miscellaneous Offences Act.

One of the farmers, Peter McSporran, confirmed that Zimbabwe's former
commercial farmers had produced a good maize crop which they would export to
Zimbabwe.

"Former commercial farmers who have settled here are close to 50," said
McSporran.

"These farmers managed to grow over 30 000 tonnes of maize and next year
this is likely to increase to about 50 000 tonnes and most of it will be
exported."

McSporran said they were also targeting Zimbabwe for the export of
agricultural seeds.

"We also hope to export seeds to Zimbabwe and this includes seed maize in
excess of 12 000 tonnes, soyabeans and wheat," he said.

Zimbabwe has a deficit of 1,2 million tonnes of maize and farmers have
complained that they do not have enough seeds for the next season.

The taskforce on food security, together with the Ministry of Lands,
Agriculture and Rural Resettlement, would work out the modalities of
importing maize after assessing the quantity required.

Mudenge acknowledged that Malawi and South Africa also had bumper harvests
and said it would be quicker and cheaper to import maize from these
countries than from suppliers in the Americas.

Ironically, Zimbabwe was a net exporter of maize before the war veterans led
farm invasions.

"I was summoned to the Law and Order Section at the Central police station,"
said Nyathi.

"I was charged under Posa and they were referring to advertisements that
appeared in our paper from May 16-19. I was made to sign a warned and
cautioned statement and they said they were still investigating the case,"
she said.

The adverts, placed by the opposition MDC, depicted a person resembling
President Mugabe being chased by a crowd. "Do you recognise him? Thief!
Thief! Thief!" the advert read.

Under Section 16 of Posa it is an offence to make any false statement about
the president where there is risk of engendering feelings of hostility
towards him.

The charge carries a fine of $100 000 or five years imprisonment or both.

On June 11 Associated Newspapers of Zimbabwe editor-in-chief Francis
Mdlongwa was charged with the same offence when he was still at the
Financial Gazette in 2002.

On Tuesday Daily News On Sunday editor Bill Saidi was charged under Posa for
authorising a report in the Daily News last year which stated that Mugabe
had arrived in South Africa to attend an ANC conference.

Condemning the charges, Zimbabwe National Editors Forum chair Iden Wetherell
said President Mugabe is not only head of state but head of government and
leader of the ruling party.

"He is therefore at the centre of the nation's robust political discourse.
His public remarks dealing with opponents or critics are often offensive and
unrestrained. Apart from that, the state media has frequently carried
falsehoods which, to the best of our knowledge, have never been investigated
by the police.

"The action of the police suggests a political agenda to target the
independent media. This selective application of the law and bid to protect
President Mugabe from legitimate public comment is unacceptable and
illustrates the lopsided political playing field in Zimbabwe."

      Land reform hits dairy/beef exports
      Augustine Mukaro

      ZIMBABWE'S unplanned land reform programme has severely cut
agricultural activities and reduced dairy and beef exports, a United Nations
agencies report says. It also shows government figures for the number of
people resettled are at variance with those estimated by land experts.

      According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation/World Food
Programme's latest Global Information and Early Warning System report dated
June 19, land reform activities have extensively disrupted farming.

      "Farming activities have been severely disrupted as many resettled
farmers lack access to capital and other inputs or need time to settle
down," the FAO/WFP report said. "This has contributed to the catastrophic
decline in the national dairy export beef herds and a record low cereal
production this year."

      The report said production of maize that has been estimated at around
800 000 tonnes, 46% lower than the 2000/1 production, would leave over 5
million people in need of food handouts.

      "The major cause of the much lower than normal production of cereals
this year includes erratic rainfall and limited availability of seed and
fertiliser. The new farmers failed to utilise all the land due to lack of
adequate capital and inputs or collateral to secure them," the report said

      The commercial farming sector now produces only 10% of its 1990s
output, it said.

      The FAO/WFP report said government would need to import an estimated
1,2 million tonnes of maize.

      "Given the acute shortage of forex, government is unlikely to import
more than 370 000 tonnes and the rest would be met by the emergency food
aid," the report said.

      Other than maize, government is also expected to import an estimated
298 000 of wheat if looming bread shortages are to be averted.

      The report said there was also a severe shortage of maize seed in the
country which if not addressed would limit plantings in the coming season.

      "Appropriate varieties of maize and also small grain seeds need to be
sourced immediately for delivery in September," it said.

      The report said 205 823 people have been allocated land under the A1
model while 28 665 benefited under the A2 model. The figures contrast with
official claims of 300 000 families resettled under the A1 scheme and more
than 50 000 under the A2 model.

The government claims Ethiopian leader Meles Zenawi's visit last July was a
state visit. But it could not have been a state visit because Zenawi is a
prime minister. Only heads of state can make state visits. And they are
accompanied by set protocol. Prime ministers don't cut it.

The state media don't fully grasp this and like to refer to official visits
as state visits.

Interestingly, Zenawi was Ethiopia's president. But constitutional changes
turned that post into a ceremonial one handing the prime minister executive
power. So he swapped jobs!

I recall Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu's state visit in 1983. He was
taken to Kintyre Estate near Lake Chivero to see its impressive cattle herd
and irrigated crops. And he was given the freedom of the City of Harare.

A ZRP officer trained in Romania impressed everybody by saying a few words
in Romanian.

Relations with Romania were closer than those with other East European
states because Ceausescu had thrown off Soviet tutelage in 1965 and pursued
an independent path just as Yugoslavia's Tito had done nearly 20 years
earlier. This opened the way for close relations with Zanu while Zapu
adhered to the Soviet bloc.

I hope Ceausescu and his wife Elena did not remove too many of the fittings
from their guest house during their stay here. When they went to London in
1968 the French president called Buckingham Palace to warn the British
royals to nail everything down. Several antique objects had gone missing
after the couple's stay as guests at the Elysée!

The Ceausescu's met a grisly end, executed on December 25 1989 after a brief
military trial. I have seen the video footage of Elena shouting at the
soldiers not to tie her and her husband up prior to their execution. Her
indignation was palpable. Here was a couple that had presided over every
facet of their nation's life - Elena even claiming authorship of scientific
articles she didn't write.

But the most striking aspect of their fall was the balcony scene at the
presidential palace. As Ceausescu addressed the normally obedient multitudes
below, a murmur of discontent began to rise from the crowd. Who started it
we shall never know. There were a few shouts. And then it became a rumble of
protest.

An official whispered in Ceausescu's ear - overheard by the microphone -
"the Securitate are coming".

But it was too late. Romania's dreaded secret police - reported at one time
to have trained our own - were unable to suppress the popular insurrection
that had erupted. Ceausescu left his palace in a helicopter but was then
intercepted by the army before he could leave the country.

The events of 1989 were instrumental in our own political evolution. The
Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia, the fall of the Berlin Wall and
Ceausescu's demise removed the ideological buttressing of the one-party
culture in Zimbabwe. President Mugabe's explanation that Zanu PF adopted
Marxist-Leninism because its sponsors espoused it is thoroughly
disingenuous. Zanu PF was able to get away with a proto-dictatorship because
it had the support of other dictatorships. When they fell, its own Berlin
Wall crumbled and Zimbabweans claimed the rights to which they were
constitutionally entitled.

Suharto followed in 1998 not long after his state visit to Zimbabwe. One by
one the old guard was booted out. Apart from Cuba and North Korea, only
China remained, and there a capitalist revolution has propelled it along an
entirely different trajectory. While China forges ahead with 8% per annum
GDP growth Zimbabwe is wallowing in its own version of the Great Leap
Forward, Mao's failed land experiment which set his country back 25 years.

Zimbabwe's isolation becomes more complete by the month. The solidarity
exhibited by blacks in the diaspora has been replaced by support for
Zimbabwe's civil society as letters to President Mugabe from influential
African American groups reveal. Even in Africa, states adopting Nepad know
the scheme has no future unless the Zimbabwe crisis is addressed.

Meanwhile, countries like Botswana, Rwanda and Uganda are growing. Uganda's
economic performance - with 6% GDP growth a year - has been among the most
successful in the world over the past decade. Its president, Yoweri
Museveni, is pursuing policies that create jobs through engagement with the
international community.

"For decades Africa has demanded aid, aid, aid," Museveni said recently in

Washington. "I don't want aid, I want trade."

Having destroyed its agricultural base, Zimbabwe is holding out the national
begging bowl to the World Food Programme for another year.

It's a long time since we saw those flags and portraits plastered around the
capital. And when was the last time President Mugabe was invited anywhere?
Are the British really so influential that they can organise a global
boycott?

What we are witnessing, both along the route to the airport with its bare
flagpoles, and above all in our economy, is the isolation of a regime that
refuses to see sense. This is a government that punishes people who carry
fuel in containers because they cannot get it at the pumps; which says we
must not carry around bank notes when the banks have no money; that breaks
up meetings of school children because it fears free speech.

Zimbabwe is rapidly becoming a failed state, not because its people are a
failure, but because its government has resorted to failed policies. So long
as those policies persist and Ceausescu's legacy lives on in Harare, the
flagpoles are likely to remain bare.

It seems slightly odd to be celebrating her book and her life as a key piece
of Africana. A nearby shop prominently displays a picture of Meryl Streep
during the filming of Out of Africa. It is as if Karen Blixen's real
achievement was that, long after her death, Robert Redford and Ms Streep
were in a film about her.

As you drive around Karen, the name boards at the gates tell their own
story - Harney, Griffiths, Koch, Bulloch, Mbwa Kali, Pelizzioli, Dobie,
Fryer, Ballantyne Evans, Cross - but the houses are invisible, for the
properties here all have several acres and long drives, populated with tall
trees and thick multi-coloured bushes.

But there is more than a touch of sadness even here.

"Lots of people are leaving," I'm told, a fact borne out by the forest of
"For Sale" signs. "Not just whites and Asians, but many black professionals.

Some of the blacks go to South Africa but otherwise they go to the same
places as the others, the US, Canada, Britain and so forth. They've just
given up on Kenya."

You can see why they might. The arrival in power of the reforming Mwai
Kibaki government has been the most heartening thing to happen in decades,
but the problems are such - and the government's naiveté so obvious - that
it is hard to believe it can quickly reverse the banditry and vigilantism,
the ubiquitous power cuts, potholes, vanishing services, sky-high prices,
and the Aids orphans in the streets.

I've spent a good deal of the last three years in Zimbabwe and the feeling
of déja vu is strong. But not complete: after all, the Zimbabwe crisis is
about the death frenzy of the liberation culture, of President Mugabe
pulling down the pillars of the building rather than be survived by his old
enemies, the white farmers. Far worse, Mugabe is deliberately trying to
starve out the half and more of Zimbabweans who support the opposition
against him.

Nothing remotely like that is going on in Kenya to explain the same
despairing emigration. The only thing in common, and perhaps the only thing
that matters, is that both countries have for too long endured an African
elite in power which knew no bounds of law, patriotism or even of
rationality in its enjoyment of power and its kleptomania.

I think of a white Zimbabwean couple I know, their Harare house a beautiful
refuge I cannot pass without a surge of warmth. As a young lawyer, Morris
abandoned his practice in the Cape after a client was re-classified from
white to coloured.

Morris set himself to fight this ruling but the client, overwhelmed by the
collapse of his marriage, the dispatch of his children to inferior schools
and the need to relocate to a slum, hung himself. Morris and his wife
Sandra, atheist Jews both, had found the incident Hitlerist and had decamped
to the more liberal world of Southern Rhodesia. Morris became a leading
lawyer; Sandra devoted herself to human rights work and, later, to helping
Aids victims.

In the end, as Mugabe destroyed the country, I helped them pack for Sydney.
Australia was a country where the pillars would not fall down. That, rather
than any sense of bitterness, was what they talked about as they packed to
leave the country they loved, which they had intended never to leave. I
remember one evening after helping them pack, lying in a bedroom full of
boxes, wondering: perhaps all whites who stay in Africa long enough will
leave as refugees.

Too many whites have behaved badly in Africa for their emigration to arouse
much sympathy. In any case, it is beside the point, which is simply that
Africa's crisis deepens by the year. If that crisis is ever to bottom out,
if recovery is ever to happen, Africa will need all the hard-working, humane
professional people it can find - countries which drive away people like
Morris and Sandra are committing suicide.

Many of the professionals who leave Africa today are Africans or Asians but
often, still, they're white. Many black professionals were brought on by
whites like Morris and Sandra; theirs was the innovating liberal impulse,
the first drive, the original model. It is this, rather than their skin
colour, which makes their leaving so significant and so sad.

It had always been hoped that the coming of democracy would see a return of
the South African diaspora, for the country had leaked talent throughout the
apartheid period. In the event, not one tenth of the white émigrés returned.
I was one of the few white returnees of the diaspora. Many, even of those
who did return, did not stay long. Everyone welcomed democracy but none
could welcome the hugely higher crime rate, the anti-white, anti-Asian and
anti-coloured discrimination in the job market and the speed with which
Nelson Mandela's rhetoric of national reconciliation gave way to Thabo
Mbeki's black nationalism.

Young whites flooded abroad in numbers - there are said to be some 300 000
in London alone - and the exodus continues. It is mainly the older age
groups who stay, which means that natural mortality will produce a huge
shrinkage in the white population in the decade or two ahead.

As the Aids debate has revealed, Thabo Mbeki feels a particular fury over
the image (which he feels to be immanent in many discussions of Aids) of
black males as sexually irresponsible "disease-carriers" and the depiction
in JM Coetzee's award-winning novel Disgrace of a gang rape had predictably
set him roaring. Disgrace was savaged by the ruling party as the epitome of
white racism and pretty clearly by the president himself. Coetzee, who has
always avoided public statements, said nothing but it was not very
surprising when, a few months later, news of his emigration slipped out.

It is a good index of how fearful and ideologically bullied the South
African intelligentsia has become that no single word of protest or even
regret was uttered at this treatment of the country's greatest writer. Much
as I admire

Disgrace, its message is surely wrong. Given that the doctrine of collective
guilt is nonsense, it follows that whites in Africa should only feel guilty
if they have individually deserved to do so.

All this must have seemed very obvious in Karen Blixen's day. What happened
in between was the great convulsion of Mau Mau, the ascent and now the
collapse of African nationalism. Even Kenyans refer disparagingly to the
group which took over in the 1960s as "the nationalists", for nationalism
turned out mainly to be a cover for theft.

It has been the same story elsewhere in Africa. The nationalist
determination to get rid of Asians and whites is a key part of this
irrational convulsion. What makes it irrational is that these are
nationalists devoid of patriotism. Moi is now reputedly the tenth richest
man in the world but Kenya's hospitals, schools and physical infrastructure
lie in ruins: everywhere the national patrimony has been plundered.
Similarly, Mugabe has cut Zimbabwe's GDP by 30% in three years and is
starving half his countrymen to death, actions justified in the name of the
same strange "nationalism" which has no regard for the national interest. -
Sunday Times.

l RW Johnson, a former South African Rhodes scholar, was fellow in politics
at Magdalen College, Oxford, for 26 years before he returned to South Africa
in 1995.

Zesa executive chairman Sydney Gata last week confirmed that the regional
players were now demanding advance payment for their power.

Last week the chairman of Eskom in South Africa Reuel Khoza said his company
had reduced from 500 megawatts to 115 megawatts the amount it would provide
to be paid in arrears, and everything above 115 megawatts now has to be paid
for in foreign exchange.

Gata said HCB supplies had been curtailed from 400 megawatts to 250
megawatts for peak period.

"HCB have already secured alternative markets for the power and have asked
Zesa to wheel the power," he said.

"HCB have given notice to terminate supply contract unless a payment plan is
put in place. Eskom now demands advance payment for their power. Eskom have
classified Zesa an interruptible customer due to payment problems. Eskom are
now charging 12% penalty per month for defaulting on payments."

Zimbabwe's foreign currency crisis has seriously affected the operations of
Zesa, which has also been rocked by several cases of industrial action by
disgruntled employees.

The parastatal, which is being commercialised before privatisation, requires
US$10,9 million every month to survive.

It needs US$5 million for power imports, US$5 million for debt service,
US$500 000 for wheeling charges and US$350 000 for spares per month.

Zesa has arrears amounting to US$109,7 million. It owes HCB US$22 million,
Eskom US$11 million, Snel US$5 million, Mozambique's EDM US$5 million, and
Zamiba's Zesco US$4 million.

The company has on several occasions introduced load shedding because of the
electricity shortages, sometimes disrupting the operations at several
companies.

The load shedding has worsened further the country's industrial production
capabilities, resulting in firms reducing output levels. Analysts said this
reduction affected the availability of consumer goods on the market, leading
to a thriving parallel market.

Gata said some of the company's constraints included an inappropriate tariff
structure and lack of a regionally benchmarked tariff that is cost
reflective.

"The cost of imported power at US3,1 cents per kilowatt is more than the
retail tariff Zesa is charging its industrial and commercial customers in
real terms," Gata said. "There is need for a new tariff adjustment mechanism
that reflects the undercurrent economic fundamentals."

He said Zesa was now unable to access offshore financing because there was
no supportive payment mechanism in place due to the foreign currency
shortage.

He said some of the parastatal's future plans included the development of
sub-transmission network to support the expanded rural electrification
programme with end use infrastructure development.

As far as distribution is concerned, Gata said they were refurbishing,
reinforcing and upgrading the national distribution network.

Gata said: "We want to complete Electricity III projects abandoned by the
World Bank and the African Development Bank urban works and service various
projects."

He said Hwange 7 and 8 needed to be expanded at a cost of US$368 million.

The project would last about three years.

Kariba South also needed to be extended at a cost of US$175 million.

This project would take about five years to complete.

Mozambique's HCB was undergoing a US$500 million upgrade and would help
Zimbabwe when this was completed in about four years time.

Gata said because the energy situation was critical, Zesa was also upgrading
the Gokwe North thermal power station at a cost of US$1,3 million and the
Batoka Gorge at a cost of US$1,1 million.

"These projects have long lead times and huge investments hence require
regional and international investor support," Gata said. "The Southern
African Power Pool market provides the market for this energy."